Apple’s new $1,099 iMac is a MacBook Air in a desktop’s body

21.5-inch entry-level model saves you $200 but loses quite a bit of power.

The 2013 iMac isn't getting an upgrade—there's just a new cheaper, slower model in town.

Andrew Cunningham

Apple isn't upgrading the iMac family today, but it is making the family a little bigger. The company is now offering a new $1,099 entry-level model that includes most of the perks of the 21.5-inch model introduced last year—the same unibody aluminum enclosure, 1080p screen, port layout, 8GB of RAM, and 802.11ac Wi-Fi adapter—but takes a significant step backward with CPU and GPU speed.

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While the $1,299 model gets you a quad-core, 2.7GHz Core i5-4570R and Intel's best integrated GPU (the Iris Pro 5200), the $1,099 model comes with a dual-core 1.4GHz Core i5-4260U and Intel's third-best integrated GPU (the HD 5000). This is the exact same processor included in the speed-bumped MacBook Airs that Apple introduced in April.

That CPU can't be upgraded at purchase, nor can the 8GB of RAM Apple includes in the unit—the old 21.5-inch iMacs have two RAM slots that can be accessed by Apple repair shops or very careful, determined users, but we don't know if that will be true for these new models. Although the base clock speed looks a little low, remember that it can ramp up to 2.7GHz in Turbo mode and that a CPU in a big desktop will be able to sustain those Turbo speeds for much longer than a similar CPU in a little laptop.

You can still replace the 500GB spinning hard drive with something larger or faster. A 1TB hard drive will run you $50, while either a 1TB Fusion Drive or 256GB SSD will add $250. We recommend that all iMac buyers at least step up to a Fusion Drive if possible, since otherwise the 5400RPM hard drive serves as a significant performance bottleneck.

Those hoping for a faster, better iMac are going to be stuck waiting, and as we've discussed before, the main culprit is Intel's delay of its Broadwell CPU architecture. Those chips were supposed to be here by the summer, but the delay means that we won't get them before September, and it may end up being even later. Without new chips, Apple (and other PC OEMs) would have a hard time delivering faster machines.

For most people, we'd still recommend treating the $1,299 iMac as the entry-level model and sticking a Fusion Drive in it while you're at it—you get a better GPU, a significantly faster CPU, and the ability to upgrade to 16GB of RAM. Especially if you use your Mac for power-intensive tasks like Photoshop or video editing, you'll absolutely notice the difference. The new iMac will be appreciated more by people who just want an Apple all-in-one and don't really care about speed. This describes many casual users, as well as schools and businesses that deploy iMacs to end users and in computer labs.

Apple has a history of offering cheaper, cut-down iMacs to schools in particular, but this is the first time a similar model has been made available to the general public. It's the second time this year Apple has lowered the price floor of its Macs—when the MacBook Air got its speed bump earlier this year, it also got a $100 price cut. The difference was that you didn't have to give anything up to save that money, and this new iMac sacrifices enough performance that we'd think twice before recommending it.

Sounds to me like Apple is reviving the Road Apples that used to be quite common in the lineup. Machines that are intentionally hobbled so as not to compete with the higher priced offerings despite not being that much cheaper.

Not bad for an entry level iMac. --- for the vast majority who just need an Internet terminal to do Facebook email, YouTube, flash games, plus some very basic photo editing and word processing, this is all they need.

It never ceases to amaze me how much they manage to charge for so little.

it's like buying a lexus compared to a toyotabut you do get better quality compared to your average crapware laden computer you buy from best buy or whereverand even then the cheapest desktop at best buy now with a core I5 is $1029

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe the Iris Pro 5200 in the Core i5 doesn't have the 128MB shared "lvl4 cache", does it? That's only available on the i7 (GT3e)? That actually makes a huge performance difference due to the bandwidth speeds accessible by the integrated GPU...

Correction: I knew there was something different in the Iris Pro chips between the i5 and i7-4770r, and it looks like it's the maximum clockspeed on the integrated graphics chip - 1.3GHz on the i7 vs 1.15GHz on the i5. Checking to see if the cache differs and will update here.

Update: It would appear that the i5-4570r does contain the 128MB eDRAM as a shared lvl 4 cache, but the only way I can verify that is on Intel's own page showing that it contains Crystalwell. I can't seem to find anything that actually states that the i5-4570r Iris Pro chip contains this cache at all, and at what size if so. Just an indirect inference: http://ark.intel.com/products/codename/ ... -Well#@All Note that I didn't spend too long searching.

Sounds to me like Apple is reviving the Road Apples that used to be quite common in the lineup. Machines that are intentionally hobbled so as not to compete with the higher priced offerings despite not being that much cheaper.

Did you forget about the eMac? The old 21" unibody iMac (edu only) in 2011? This is not a revival, the difference is they are offering it to the public to increase volumes.

It never ceases to amaze me how much they manage to charge for so little.

it's like buying a lexus compared to a toyotabut you do get better quality compared to your average crapware laden computer you buy from best buy or whereverand even then the cheapest desktop at best buy now with a core I5 is $1029

And you probably need to buy software for that cheap desktop, whereas on the Macs it will come with pretty much everything you need for most non-specialized tasks.

It never ceases to amaze me how much they manage to charge for so little.

it's like buying a lexus compared to a toyotabut you do get better quality compared to your average crapware laden computer you buy from best buy or wherever

That's what makes them great, their ability to make you believe that.

yeah, this weekend i have to go to my inlaws to wipe their laptop and install windows from scratch because the best buy store and other crap ware is slowing the computer down. Dell's used to be the worst. you would boot it up for the first time and there would be half a dozen "trial" programs popping up asking for your credit card to buy it. and very hard to get rid ofcompared to my Macbook Pro where i bought it and it boots up to the OS and that's it

I don't understand why Apple focuses so much on making desktop computers smaller and thinner. The point of a desktop computer is that you trade portability for power. The iMac is already thin enough to not take up much space on a desk; saving a miniscule amount of desk space or power is not worth using parts that undermine the purpose of a desktop computer.

It never ceases to amaze me how much they manage to charge for so little.

it's like buying a lexus compared to a toyotabut you do get better quality compared to your average crapware laden computer you buy from best buy or whereverand even then the cheapest desktop at best buy now with a core I5 is $1029

And you probably need to buy software for that cheap desktop, whereas on the Macs it will come with pretty much everything you need for most non-specialized tasks.

yep, and now you get the apple office lite apps for free as well when you buy a new computer.

It never ceases to amaze me how much they manage to charge for so little.

it's like buying a lexus compared to a toyotabut you do get better quality compared to your average crapware laden computer you buy from best buy or wherever

That's what makes them great, their ability to make you believe that.

yeah, this weekend i have to go to my inlaws to wipe their laptop and install windows from scratch because the best buy store and other crap ware is slowing the computer down. Dell's used to be the worst. you would boot it up for the first time and there would be half a dozen "trial" programs popping up asking for your credit card to buy it. and very hard to get rid ofcompared to my Macbook Pro where i bought it and it boots up to the OS and that's it

Just going to point out that there's a confounding variable here - your inlaws and their computer using practices vs you and your computing practices. I'm going to bet that you're a bit more careful when perusing "the internets" then your inlaws. You give a Mac to a computer illiterate person, and they can mess that up too, unsurprisingly.

It never ceases to amaze me how much they manage to charge for so little.

it's like buying a lexus compared to a toyotabut you do get better quality compared to your average crapware laden computer you buy from best buy or whereverand even then the cheapest desktop at best buy now with a core I5 is $1029

Now, I certainly won't argue that the iMac in question is of higher quality, more compact, and one would be required to additionally purchase a 21.5" monitor, and that's what you're paying for. But to suggest you can't get a PC with an i5 for under $1000 is absurd.

Well I'm in a market for a new Thunderbolt display and with $100 difference between an iMac and a Thunderbolt Display means I can get a whole computer as well. I won't necessarily use it but the option is there. However, I can't imagine there's that many people who need that functionality. Makes me curious if there's an imminent price drop on TB displays once iMacs and TB's are upgraded to retina counterparts...

It never ceases to amaze me how much they manage to charge for so little.

it's like buying a lexus compared to a toyotabut you do get better quality compared to your average crapware laden computer you buy from best buy or wherever

That's what makes them great, their ability to make you believe that.

When an argument boils down to "Using sorcery, they make you want something despite the fact it's obviously garbage, and also to despite the fact I can't really enumerate how it's garbage", you lose the argument.

edit: To add why this is a bogus argument, Apple has had plenty of duds, despite their apparent black marketing magic. So, if something Apple is popular, it doesn't follow that it is because, "Apple marketing, see?"

It just sounds stupid. Why put an Ultrabook CPU in an enclosure that has the heat dissipation for an i7? A cheaper and faster i3 sounds like a much better fit.Unless they have a lot of the i5s lying around and need to get rid of them.

I don't understand why Apple focuses so much on making desktop computers smaller and thinner. The point of a desktop computer is that you trade portability for power. The iMac is already thin enough to not take up much space on a desk; saving a miniscule amount of desk space or power is not worth using parts that undermine the purpose of a desktop computer.

1) Volume pricing for parts works in their favor2) Reducing volume and mass increases profits by shaving shipping, transport, warehouse, and package costs. 3) Their most popular computer is the iPhone and iPad, which have much lower performance. They know more about the market than we do. 4) Their most popular Mac is the MBA, which tells them something about the desktop use case. In a desktop without thermal or battery constraints, this setup will be more powerful than the MBA.

Plenty of other options out there, the point is, Apple charges a premium for a sleek design that some people think is worthwhile. I don't care how people spend their money, and have no problem with Apple, I just don't value the looks enough to justify the extra cost.

Pretty much irrelevant - it might cost a few more dollars per package but using cheaper desktop parts more than makes up for that.

Quote:

3) Their most popular computer is the iPhone and iPad, which have much lower performance. They know more about the market than we do. 4) Their most popular Mac is the MBA, which tells them something about the desktop use case. In a desktop without thermal or battery constraints, this setup will be more powerful than the MBA.

Right, so people want their portables to be portable. I'd think people would want their non-portables to have some advantage over portables, hence why they buy them.

Plenty of other options out there, the point is, Apple charges a premium for a sleek design that some people think is worthwhile. I don't care how people spend their money, and have no problem with Apple, I just don't value the looks enough to justify the extra cost.

For the sake of argument, I accept the systems you posted are roughly equivalent. But you are arguing a truism.

"Apple charges a premium for their design that they think is worth charging their premium for. And people accept it".

Plenty of other options out there, the point is, Apple charges a premium for a sleek design that some people think is worthwhile. I don't care how people spend their money, and have no problem with Apple, I just don't value the looks enough to justify the extra cost.

The point is that the price difference for equivalent internal parts is not that high. Perhaps 20% Apple Tax.Which is fair for most people for the amazing case quality the for most people better operating system. ( With Win7 Microsoft almost had them and then they fucked it up again. Windows is better for people who need to run pretty much any software but for all the standard tasks OSX is just nicer)

What I hate about Apple is their attempt to cripple their entry level systems and the fact that they provide so few choice simply to force you to pay much more money than you want. You want a decent CPU: Haha now you need to buy a bigger systems, more ram, a bigger disc and a pony as well. You want a 15" Notebook? That is 2k please.

Macs are not overpriced it is just that the pricing model is the work of an evil genius always trying to push you to spend much more money than you would have to. Sure you get an awesome system but your bank account is empty.

This only reinforces my longstanding opinion of, Apple's laptops are great if you have the money to burn, but their desktops represent a pretty horrible value proposition. In my experience, Macbooks/Pros are more pleasant to use as laptops (better screen panel, often better resolution than competing Windows desktops, better trackpad, better keyboard). But as a desktop company...yeah, not worth the markup IMO.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe the Iris Pro 5200 in the Core i5 doesn't have the 128MB shared "lvl4 cache", does it? That's only available on the i7 (GT3e)? That actually makes a huge performance difference due to the bandwidth speeds accessible by the integrated GPU...

Correction: I knew there was something different in the Iris Pro chips between the i5 and i7-4770r, and it looks like it's the maximum clockspeed on the integrated graphics chip - 1.3GHz on the i7 vs 1.15GHz on the i5. Checking to see if the cache differs and will update here.

Update: It would appear that the i5-4570r does contain the 128MB eDRAM as a shared lvl 4 cache, but the only way I can verify that is on Intel's own page showing that it contains Crystalwell. I can't seem to find anything that actually states that the i5-4570r Iris Pro chip contains this cache at all, and at what size if so. Just an indirect inference: http://ark.intel.com/products/codename/ ... -Well#@All Note that I didn't spend too long searching.

Iris Pro 5200 always has the cache. Iris 5100 is the same GPU with no cache. Aside from clock speed there's no difference between the i5 and i7.

My guess would be that they don't want to ship the HD 4600 GPU in anything. Almost all of Intel's socketed desktop CPUs come with that, and none of them come with the HD 5000 or better (even the Iris-equipped desktop CPUs aren't socketed - they're all soldered to the motherboard).

As stated in the article, that 1.4GHz base clock speed is a little misleading in this case. Since it's a desktop with good heat dissipation, the CPU should be running closer to its 2.7GHz Turbo speed most of the time if you're gaming or doing something CPU intensive.

Andrew Cunningham / Andrew has a B.A. in Classics from Kenyon College and has over five years of experience in IT. His work has appeared on Charge Shot!!! and AnandTech, and he records a weekly book podcast called Overdue.